SOME KIND OF HEAVEN
Cert 12 ★★★★★ On dogwoof.com, Amazon, iTunes and Curzon Home Cinema now
“Disney World for retirees” is how one resident describes The Villages, a sprawling Florida complex where 130,000 well-heeled Americans have bought into a dream of perpetual fun.
With its manicured lawns, spotless swimming pools and fake heritage architecture, it also carries a surreal, even sinister, edge.
In this excellent documentary, there’s a touch of Westworld or even Black Mirror in early sequences detailing the complex’s bizarre societies.
There’s a club for women called Elaine, another for margarita drinkers, and an event where elderly belly dancers twirl around to Dean Martin’s Let It Snow.
The son of the founder reveals how it was built as a vision of a golden age that never existed. But director Lance Oppenheim mostly wants to see it through the eyes of its misfits.
Dennis, a broke 81-year-old, literally lives on the margins. He’s taken to sleeping in his van on the outskirts of Funland, sneaking in to shower at a swimming pool and blag an all-inclusive breakfast.
But, when night falls, he comes alive. In his mind, Dennis is a ladies’ man and, with thousands of wealthy widows hitting the nightclubs each night, Dennis has plenty of victims to subject to his toe-curling patter.
Resident Reggie has taken a different path. Leaving his saintly wife Anne at the tennis club, the 72-year-old has gone on a voyage of self-discovery after discovering hallucinogenic drugs.
But the most touching story belongs to Barbara, a morose-looking widow who works in the nursing department. After 12 years of watching organised fun from a distance, she’s decided to join in.
This big-hearted film finds messy human drama in a regimented paradise.